


Run

by Rroselavy



Category: Saiyuki
Genre: AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-29
Updated: 2010-06-29
Packaged: 2017-10-10 07:58:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/97429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rroselavy/pseuds/Rroselavy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When he agrees to help Kouryuu, Shuuei knows that the teen has more to fear than just the law.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Run

When Shuuei came home from his third-shift job at the processing plant, Kouryuu was waiting for him on the porch. In the dim light of the pre-dawn, Shuuei could sense something was wrong, even before he saw the blood. It coated Kouryuu's hands, his arms, his thin sleep shirt, dripped on his sleep shorts and spattered on his face mingling with tears, creating a macabre, living canvas.

Wordlessly Shuuei dropped his duffel on the walk. Kouryuu's violet eyes were wide, his fine features cut in sharp relief by the blood.

"Help me," he whispered.

Shuuei's hair stood on end as the boy grabbed him, transferring some of the fresh blood to his sleeves.

"Where are you hurt?" He murmured, standing stock still. He couldn't touch him, wouldn't.

"It's Koumyou." Kouryuu tugged at his arm, but Shuuei stood rooted where he was.

_Don't go, they'll blame you and you'll go back to jail._

I have to. Koumyou was the only one who trusted me. If he's hurt--

"Please, Shuuei. You're the only one." The tears were streaming down Kouryuu's cheeks.

Shuuei's feet began to move over the dew-laden grass, across his lawn - he'd been meaning to cut it - and towards Koumyou's well-kept, whitewashed bungalow. The grey-painted wooden steps creaked as they tread on them, the sound amplified by the silence that surrounded them. Somewhere far off a bird twittered and was answered. He stepped onto the porch, past the potted geraniums, their pungent fragrance perfuming the calm air.

_Idiot. If you go in there-_

"Shut up!" he hissed.

Kouryuu stopped cold. He was almost as tall as Shuuei now, he must have been sixteen, seventeen perhaps? He'd been fourteen when Shuuei had rented the run-down place next door.

_He's not a kid anymore. It's safe-- _

Yeah, keep telling yourself that when they slap the 'cuffs on your wrists.

Then Kouryuu was pulling at his sleeve again, tugging him over the beckoning threshold.

* * *

"Come in, come in!"

"I ... I can't. I shouldn't be near young children. You know that, Koumyou."

"Yes, yes. The police sent letters to the whole community, the entire town, actually." Grey-green eyes pierced him, peered into his very core. "But you have a good soul, Shuuei. I can tell these things." A hand gripped his forearm and held fast as he recoiled. He had no choice but to step inside.

* * *

Kouryuu stopped just inside the still house and refused to budge.

"He's in there." A thin, shaking arm pointed down the hall to where the two modest bedrooms were located.

Shuuei followed the path of bloody footprints through the silent house, nearly jumping out of his skin when the condenser to the old refrigerator kicked in as he walked past it. The floorboards groaned under his feet and he took deep breaths, willing himself to calm down. Of course he would help Koumyou. The man was the only friend he had.

He found Koumyou in Kouryuu's room and Shuuei didn't need to touch him to know that he was already gone. Blood had pooled around the body, had tinged Koumyou's mass of hair an unnatural red. A jumble of bloody bare-footprints circled him; a grim handprint marred the pristine doorjamb. Koumyou was a putterer. He'd invariably be found with a tool or a paintbrush in his hand; his house, almost as much as his son, was his pride and joy. It was a shame to see it sullied so; it would make Koumyou unhappy.

Shuuei's first coherent thought as he tried to comprehend the scene was that at least he had an alibi; he'd only clocked out minutes before he arrived home, it had only been minutes since then.

"Is he okay?"

He whirled around, the motion knocking something off of the dresser; a river rock skittered to a stop under the bed. Weapon? He doubted it; a glance told him there was no residue of blood on the mirrored wood surface.

Shuuei wrapped his hands over his biceps; the shirt beneath his palms was damp, damp with Koumyou's blood and his own sweat that had bloomed over his body. In his mind he calculated how much DNA he was probably leaving behind. He shook his head.

"What happened?"

Kouryuu shrugged, hugging himself tightly. His eyes were the size of saucers as they drifted between Shuuei and Koumyou's inert body. He let out a shuddering sob.

* * *

"Kouryuu? You see, he's not related to me by blood, but I am his father." Koumyou looked up from the stream of tea he was pouring, steam curling visible tendrils into the air. The snow was still coming down, racing past frosted windows, piling up on the sills, on the walkway they'd just cleared. At the rate it was falling, they'd be out again within the hour, tracing over the same paths they'd just cut. Kouryuu had left them in the kitchen and gone back to the book he was reading, he was curled up in the wingback chair next to the fireplace, already deeply engrossed. The boy was a loner-- Shuuei stopped his thoughts before they could continue on to the texture of Kouryuu's hair or the clearness of his young complexion; how either might feel under the pads of his fingertips. Shuuei glanced up at his friend. He felt warm under Koumyou's gaze, but he wasn't embarrassed. Koumyou knew his history, but still, he'd invited him into his home, the other members of the community be damned. Koumyou was not one to suffer convention. Shuuei had learned that early in their friendship.

"I found him when he was just a newborn."

Shuuei wanted to ask how that worked, how Koumyou, a single man who'd never been married -- who seemed to have been dropped to Earth from some higher plane -- had managed to keep the baby that had been literally left on his doorstep, but something stayed Shuuei's tongue. The man had offered him companionship -- camaraderie -- far be it for him to question it.

* * *

Kouryuu was shaking like a leaf.

_He needs to be comforted._

I can't!

You want to.

Koumyou trusts--

Koumyou -- his father -- is dead. Kouryuu needs you now.

That wasn't the reason why Shuuei reached out awkwardly and folded Kouryuu in an embrace. That's what he told himself even though he knew it was a lie, but Shuuei swore he wouldn't breach Koumyou's trust. The boy needed someone to lean on and had chosen him, for better or worse.

Kouryuu buried his face against Shuuei's neck and, as great tremors wracked his body, the tears began to fall again. They slid down the column of his neck and under Shuuei's coarse work-shirt, prickling his skin. Shuuei rubbed Kouryuu's back soothingly.

"It's going to be okay," he offered. Both of them knew he was lying and Kouryuu shook his head vigorously against his collarbone. "We'll figure it out together," he sighed, his breath sending the fine ends of Kouryuu's hair aloft.

* * *

"No one in this damned town will hire me." He sat in one rocking chair on Koumyou's porch, his friend in the matching seat. On the low table between them was a pitcher of iced-tea sweating in the sweltering heat. Flies buzzed angrily at the screens that protected them and cabbage moths flitted over flowers bedecking the overgrown shrubs that had been planted at the foundation of the house long before Koumyou had taken possession of it. The old floor creaked as Shuuei rocked absently back and forth.

"I can help with that." Koumyou's voice was measured, wary.

Shuuei looked away from one of the fat insects that had landed on the screen. "You've already done so much, Koumyou." He'd cracked open the door on his universe of two to let Shuuei in, he couldn't impose any more than that!

"Nonsense. It will be menial at best, certainly not what you are capable of."

No, no one had that much power. Shuuei knew he'd never be allowed to teach again.

"But it will satisfy the terms of your parole."

* * *

It was the sirens that finally set Shuuei into action. He pushed Kouryuu away roughly. "You called the cops?!"

Kouryuu looked shocked for a second before his face returned to its normal, unreadable expression. "What else was I supposed to do?" he intoned, his eyes, flat.

Shuuei surveyed the crime-scene, forcing himself to remain calm. He tried not to imagine the call to 911, all the evidence -- the ammunition -- Kouryuu had already given to the police. It would be a no-brainer for them to pin it all on the kid. He gathered his thoughts, then he grabbed Kouryuu by the shoulders and shook him.

"They're going to take you in for questioning. No matter what, don't confess to something you didn't do." Clear violet regarded him, and for a second Shuuei detected disdain. He blinked his eyes and the expression was gone.

"Do you think I killed him?"

Shuuei dropped his hands from Kouryuu's shoulders. It didn't matter what _he_ thought! But another look into those eyes and Shuuei knew it _did_ matter.

"Of course not." His heart was racing the closer the sirens sounded. He imagined all the neighbors gathering on their lawns, their stoops, the gossip that would abound. Shuuei reached for Kouryuu's hand then thought the better of it.

"Come with me, we'll meet them on the porch."

* * *

Except for briefly at the memorial service, Shuuei didn't see Kouryuu again for three days. There the teen had been flanked by two police officers, his hands cuffed in front of him, though, he informed Shuuei without his inquiry, he was only being held for questioning. The officers, both local men whom Shuuei had seen on numerous occasions looked both uncomfortable yet frustrated with their charge. It seemed that Kouryuu was made of rare mettle, just as his father had been. He wasn't budging from the spare story that he'd given in his statement.

He'd been the only person to come up to Kouryuu other than to express his condolences. The rest of their neighbors and their children had kept a polite distance. Shuuei kept looking over his shoulder, expecting Koumyou to breeze into the sickly-sweet fragranced room so they could share a good laugh.

The picture that graced the simple closed casket was the one that had sat prominently on top of the old console TV that Koumyou had allowed in the house. It featured a younger incarnation of the man, his long blond hair pulled back into a ponytail, holding a solemn baby with the most amazing, intense, violet-hued eyes. In it, Koumyou was beaming like the proud father he'd always been.

He turned back to Kouryuu, wary of the police. "If there's anything you need, you let me know."

"Make sure you get that," Kouryuu nodded his chin toward the wooden frame. "And his ashes when they are delivered tomorrow. Don't let them sit on the porch."

It was only then that Shuuei broke down and cried, turning away to hide his emotions from the boy. A heavy, cuffed hand, its mate trailing behind landed on his shoulder.

"It's going to be okay." Kouryuu's voice averred, strong and even.

Later that day Shuuei finally got around to trimming his lawn. He cut Koumyou's grass for good measure and then watered the potted plants his friend had cared for so meticulously.

He overheard some of their other neighbors talking. They marveled at how emotionless the kid had been. Shuuei snorted; they were already indicting Kouryuu.

Later that day Shuuei's job called as a courtesy, explaining that he was no longer needed.

* * *

He couldn't stay there, not when everything about Koumyou was being dismantled and picked apart. The 'adoption' hadn't been legal. There was talk that his relationship with Kouryuu was improper; that the boy had murdered him to break the cycle of abuse. Shuuei couldn't stand to see his friend's reputation, his life, his world blackened by the vicious rumors. But he was powerless to stop them, and he felt more than a little guilty that it was Koumyou's act of friendship to him, a convicted sex abuser, which fueled the flames.

He glanced at the small, inconspicuous corrugated box that sat by his door - the sum total of what remained of his friend. As soon as Kouryuu was released he would give him the ashes and the picture and be on his way. Shuuei had no idea where he would go next, he only knew he needed to escape. All his personal effects had been neatly packed into a bag which he hoisted to his shoulder. He was already walking toward the door when someone banged on it impatiently. Kouryuu was standing on the other side of the screen. Shuuei pushed the door open.

"I have your things," he said hurriedly, dropping the bag to collect Koumyou's remains along with the guestbook from the funeral home, sympathy cards and the picture.

"You're leaving." Kouryuu stated flatly, not a question but rather an observation.

Shuuei stood with the other things balanced on the box, holding the items out for the teen. Kouryuu's eyes flickered over the objects disinterestedly and then met Shuuei's gaze. He made no attempt to take them.

He sighed. "I was let go."

Kouryuu continued to stare and Shuuei found himself hypnotized by the unfathomable depths of violet. After a few seconds passed in silence, Kouryuu finally spoke.

"They think I killed him. They aren't even looking for anyone else." Shuuei nodded his head; he'd figured as much. Kouryuu looked down at the bag again. He looked thinner than usual and paler.

"When did they let you go?"

"A little while ago. Where are you going?"

The question took Shuuei by surprise. In the time that he'd known the boy, Kouryuu had barely spoken to him. Not that that meant anything, Kouryuu spoke to no one except for Koumyou.

"I don't know. Away from here," Shuuei shrugged. Away from memories that would soon be too painful for him to bear. He set Koumyou's ashes and all the other things on the table next to the door, pushing the telephone to one side to make room. "Are you okay, do you have any family to come help you? Anyone you can stay with?" Koumyou had never spoken about relatives, and he and Kouryuu had never entertained any out of town guests, or anyone, except him, for that matter.

Kouryuu shook his head slowly, his eyes riveted to the satchel. "Take me with you?"

Shuuei brought his hand to his forehead, hundreds of reasons why that was a bad idea clamoring in his mind, vying for his attention; at the top of the list was his attraction to the teen. "I just told you, I don't know where I'm going."

"I don't care. I can't stay here." Kouryuu said simply.

"The police --"

"The police think I killed Koumyou." He said it slowly this time, as if the first time Shuuei had misunderstood. "They aren't going to be satisfied until they've charged me. I should just confess and make it easy for everyone."

"Confess to something you didn't do?" Shuuei felt indignant for Koumyou. "Throw away the life Koumyou made for you?" Kouryuu flinched and Shuuei regretted his words.

"That life is gone."

Shuuei looked down at his feet his hands clenched into fists. When he looked up again, Kouryuu was gone, but he'd left Koumyou's remains behind. Taking a deep breath, Shuuei picked up Kouryuu's belongings and walked across his new-mowed lawn, over to the other house.

The screen door was loose on its hinges, swinging against the clapboard siding. Shuuei looked into the dark entryway, dull rasping sounds, accompanied by muted thuds.

"Kouryuu?" Shuuei called out softly; he was mindful of crossing the threshold uninvited, even though he'd been in Koumyou's house hundreds of times. There was no answer, but as he stood trying to decide what to do Kouryuu materialized from the shadows. He slung a backpack over his shoulder.

"Where are you going?" Shuuei blurted.

"Away from here. Maybe I can find the killers," Kouryuu eyed him warily, daring Shuuei to try to stop him. They were almost the same height, he noted, in a year or so, Kouryuu might even be taller than him.

"Kouryuu, if you know who-"

"I don't. I just know it wasn't me, but no one in this town believes that."

"I do." Shuuei shifted his packages, cradling them to his body in one arm and reached to stay Kouryuu with the other. He expected resistance and when he ended up with his back pressed against the wall, Kouryuu's sinewy frame pressed the length of his, his fingers curling over Shuuei's shoulders. He lost his grip; the box, the cards and the picture slid helplessly away from him, landing in a pile at his feet. The backpack soon followed.

"I'll go with you," he breathed in Kouryuu's scent, the salty tang of dried sweat perfuming his nose. He tilted Kouryuu's chin so that their gazes met. Their lips were inches apart and Shuuei could feel Kouryuu's breath wafting over his skin. "We won't get very far."

"I just need to get far enough away for someone to listen to me," he rasped fiercely. Shuuei nodded his head. He was dizzy from the closeness, from the emotions, desires, _needs_ roiling under his skin. He closed his eyes and steadied his breathing. His hands gripped Kouryuu's arms. Slowly, he pushed the boy away. He realized they were probably being watched already. He pulled Kouryuu into a comforting embrace.

"We'll leave tonight, at eleven, when I would leave for my shift," he whispered, his hand rubbing soothingly over Kouryuu's back. "Sneak into the back seat of my car and cover yourself with the blanket in there. Lie on the floor. If you aren't there, I'm leaving without you, understand?"

Kouryuu pulled away. "Why-"

"Thank you for the clothes, Kouryuu," Shuuei said meaningfully as he picked up the backpack that had been discarded to the floor. Crouching, he gathered up the papers and righted the box, a twinge of guilt coursing through him. Kouryuu crouched next to him. "I'm sure you're being watched, if they have any idea you're bolting, they'll be all over y-us."

Shuuei stood, relieved that his breathing had turned to normal. He handed Kouryuu the papers he'd collected, then swung the backpack easily onto his shoulder.

"Koumyou was my best friend," he said, his voice slightly amplified. "I'll cherish this forever." He reached his hand out and cupped Kouryuu's cheek, his thumb tracing over the fine bone for a moment before his hand dropped away.

* * *

The days bled into weeks. They spent their time driving east, always east, towards the coast and all the big cities. Shuuei knew they'd stick out in small towns and would be caught easier, despite the peroxide that had tipped the ends of his hair blond and the red that now haloed Kouryuu's face. As they traveled Shuuei picked up handy work as he could and earned what he could hustling at pool or darts. It afforded a meager living, but they were surviving, and each day that advanced put them further away from the life they'd left behind.

At first they barely talked, the miles were whiled away in silence. Kouryuu was deep in mourning and Shuuei felt his own grief acutely, but also he wasn't sure what to say; the boy had never been a conversationalist. But Koumyou was with them too, wrapped up in his neat little box. Someday, Shuuei vowed, they'd get a proper receptacle. That notion stopped his thoughts like he'd been hit by a freight train. Glancing over at Kouryuu he reminded himself there was no 'they,' Kouryuu had simply agreed to escape with Shuuei because he needed the ride.

It wasn't long after they'd found a room in a run-down but clean boarding house that the nightmares began. Shuuei would awaken to the sound of Kouryuu's heavy breathing, mumbled words, tears streaming down his face. Shuuei comforted him the best he could, soothing him, gently rousing him to wakefulness. Kouryuu never spoke of his dreams, but Shuuei had a good idea that he was reliving the night Koumyou died, over and over again.

They pushed the narrow beds together -- ostensibly because Shuuei didn't have to get out of bed in the middle of the night when Kouryuu woke him, but in his mind, Shuuei knew that it was just one more thing bringing him one step closer to breaking his promise to Koumyou. He felt a tightness constrict his chest when he thought about that, but it didn't stop him from gazing at Kouryuu surreptitiously in varying states of undress, or allowing his hands to linger a little longer than necessary on Kouryuu's supple skin when Shuuei had pulled him into his arms as he consoled the teen from his dreams.

It wasn't long after that that Kouryuu began to sleep next to Shuuei, taking comfort in his closeness. Invariably Shuuei would wake up with the teen snuggled against him. On those mornings it was all he could do not to press into the pliant, sleepy boy, grinding their hips together, slowly rocking in a lazy, building rhythm. On those mornings Shuuei would find cold comfort in an icy shower, staying under the frigid spray until his teeth chattered and his lips had turned blue.

He found a night job, thinking it would help, but after three days Kouryuu switched his sleeping habits. He spent his nights alone, watching TV, waiting for Shuuei to come home from his shift so that he could crawl into bed with him. On good days Kouryuu would awaken before Shuuei and have the coffee brewed and warming on the hot plate and breakfast waiting for him when he woke up.

And so they fell into a routine, and the acute ache Shuuei felt at the loss of his friend gradually ebbed to a dull pain, ameliorated by time and by Kouryuu's presence. But at the same token, Shuuei's growing attraction to the teen was a renewed source of angst. Even though he'd come to realize that it was genuine and not illicit, Shuuei was loathe to take advantage of Kouryuu. So he pushed his needs aside, pretending that they didn't exist. Just as he pretended that they weren't fugitives from the law; that they lived under the cloud of being scooped up; their lives turned upside down.

He began to crave Kouryuu's scent, the heat from his skin. As much as he wanted Kouryuu, Shuuei was also aware of how entranced he was by the way Kouryuu's thick lashes fanned out on flawless, pale skin of his cheeks, or by the delicate pattern made by the thin blue veins in his eyelids. Shuuei liked to watch over Kouryuu when he slept; it was the only time the boy's experience-hardened features softened into the adolescent that he was. It was only then that his lips would sometimes tug into a smile. Even rarer were the times he would laugh in his sleep, taking Shuuei's breath away. Sometimes his fingers would steal over Kouryuu's cheek, or stroke his bare shoulder when he curved against Shuuei in his sleep.

* * *

Summer faded into winter and the early evenings heightened Shuuei's sense of claustrophobia and the fear that they were being closed in on. They'd been in one place for too long, but the cold and snow kept him rooted there, cocooned as he was in a world that had shrunk to include just he and Kouryuu. Kouryuu had found work in a design studio; besides doing menial office chores he was apprenticing with a designer. For a while the nightmares had subsided, though it didn't change their sleeping arrangement; Shuuei slowly came to the realization that Kouryuu needed his presence just as much as he needed the boy's. He'd been elevated beyond convenience; he fought against the poisonous thought that he'd been cast as a replacement for Koumyou.

He woke up one morning barely able to breathe, Kouryuu's entire weight pinning him down, his hands fisting the thin t-shirt Shuuei had left on as a shield from the ever-present chill in their drafty room.

"Please make it stop!" Kouryuu's tears fell up his cheek and Shuuei felt the wetness slide over the contour to trickle into his ear. He raised his hands and gripped Kouryuu's slender wrists. Their bodies, pressed together as they were, began to respond from the proximity; Shuuei could feel a telltale hardness pressing against his hip.

"Stop what?" His voice was rougher than he expected, made husky by the months he'd lived in denial of his attraction.

Kouryuu dipped his head until his lips hovered over Shuuei's. "The pain," he whispered against them. "The nightmares," he said, closing the distance. For a few seconds they were motionless in the chaste kiss, each afraid to move, to break the fragile spell that had been woven between them. Shuuei mentally scrambled for reasons to pull away to stop himself before he reached the point he could not turn back from, but he had denied his heart for too long. He released his hold on Kouryuu's wrists and fisted his hair. Crushing their lips together, Shuuei parted his, his tongue licking along the seam of Kouryuu's before demanding access to the moist heat within. When Kouryuu responded, the last vestige of his control was lost. Shuuei rolled them over, pinning the lithe body beneath him. They went at each other savagely, pulling bedclothes off roughly until they were writhing naked against each other hands roving over heated flesh, mouths trailing nips and kisses over whatever skin was within reach.

Shuuei laid kisses down the hollow of Kouryuu's smooth chest then detoured to flick his tongue over a rosy nipple before taking the hardening flesh into his mouth. Kouryuu moaned and buried his hands in Shuuei's spiky hair, his fingers tightening against Shuuei's scalp. The slight pain brought him to his senses, curbing his desire until it was manageable. His impending orgasm, however, was less likely. He threaded his hand between their bodies and, his tongue and teeth still worrying the pointed nub, he took both erections in his hand, pressing them together and stroking them in tandem. The sensation was incredible; the feel of Kouryuu's hot, hard cock in his palm and against his own sex was mind-blowing. Kouryuu cried out, arching his neck, his eyes squeezing shut and Shuuei felt his spend dripping over his fingers. He came hard at that sensation, grinding his pelvis against the body beneath him as he rode out his climax.

Slowly Shuuei's senses came back to him as their breathing began to slow. Kouryuu was motionless underneath him and for a few seconds he was afraid to glance at the teen's face; he was mortified that he'd broken his sacred trust. When he did venture a look, Kouryuu's eyes were still closed. Shuuei moved to roll off of him, surprised when Kouryuu moved with him.

He threaded a tentative hand through damp red hair. "Are-are you okay?" he asked, his voice barely a whisper. Kouryuu nodded his head against his chest, burrowing closer to Shuuei. Their come was slowly cooling on his body; he imagined it was as uncomfortable for Kouryuu as it was for him. He began to sit up, intent on getting tissues to clean them both off.

"Don't leave me," Kouryuu whispered. His hand shot out, grabbing Shuuei's arm.

"I'm not going anywhere," he assured the teen, making sure to smile when a violet eye peeked out from under unruly bangs. "Except to get something to clean us up," he added, untangling himself from the bed linens.

As he padded towards the dresser, Kouryuu called after him. "Thank you Shuuei. For everything."

He swallowed hard and looked at the small box next to the tissues. Running his hand over the corrugated cardboard's worn edges, he wondered what his old friend thought of him now.


End file.
